church leaders- christiansquoting.org.uk

Ministers need to eat for two. Feed me for their sake.

I remember myself, that when I was young, I had sometime the company of one ancient godly minister, who was of weaker parts than many others, but yet did profit me more than most; because he would never in prayer or conference speak of God, or the life to come, but with such marvelous seriousness and reverence, as if he had seen the majesty and glory which he talked of. - RICHARD BAXTER

An elastic ecclesiastic -- J Blanchard

The lives of ministers oftentimes convince more strongly than their words; their tongues may persuade, but their lives command.- Thomas Brooks

We must always speak of the efficacy of the ministry in such a manner that the entire praise of the work may be reserved for God alone.
John Calvin (1509-1564)

If some Christians that have been complaining of their ministers had said and acted less before men and had applied themselves with all their might to cry to God for their ministers -- had, as it were, risen and stormed heaven with their humble, fervent, and incessant prayers for them -- they would have been much more in the way of success.-- Jonathan Edwards

Perhaps no one sins more outrageously in our age, or is more characteristic of the slackness we tolerate, than the priest and the theologian who reduce God to no more than a concept but insist that they believe enough to remain members of their church or temple. They are making it awkward to be an atheist. ...Why stand outside the doors of the church as an atheist, and think gravely of the falsehoods preached within that one feels compelled to combat, when all the time one could just step inside and in God's own house preach against them in His name? --Henry Fairlie, _The Seven Deadly Sins Today_

We never find a presbyter in the singular in the New Testament. He is always a member of a team. In the modern church, the ordained man is almost always on his own in the community, unless he is lucky enough to have a colleague, or to be a member of a team ministry. We expect the ordained man to be almost omnicompetent, and complain at his deficiencies. This is an extremely serious error. It is very bad for the man himself to be made to feel that he is the sole minister: it may lead to despair, arrogance, blindness to the true situation, and inhibiting the gifts of others. It is bad for the parish: they become critical and lazy. When the different limbs in Christ's body are not allowed their special ministry, they are harmed and their gifts atrophy. The ordained man too is harmed, for he has to attempt to do various ministries for which he has no charisma from God, and the church cannot be adequately cared for. ... E. M. B. Green (1930- ), "Mission and Ministry"

Because the role of the Christian leader is to preach, teach, act as a shepherd, [and] be an example in personal and family life, the New Testament properly insists that he must not be a new convert nor a young man. He must have proved himself [and] demonstrated his God-given charisma for leadership, before he looks to the Church for recognition of it through ordination. Here once again we stand in marked contrast to the New Testament... The early Christians laid great stress on quality of life. A leader must merit respect,with his sexual, drinking [and] financial habits beyond reproach, a man of experience, a family man, someone who has led others to the faith and built Christians up in it. We go, on the whole, for untried men whose degree matters more than their lives, and who may never have led anyone to belief in Christ, or may even regard the whole idea as distasteful. ... E. M. B. Green (1930- ), "Mission and Ministry"

The devil will let a preacher prepare a sermon if it will keep him from preparing himself.--Vance Havner

Every wise workman takes his tools away from the work from time to time that they may be ground and sharpened; so does the only-wise Jehovah take his ministers oftentimes away into darkness and loneliness and trouble, that he may sharpen and prepare them for harder work in his service.
Robert Murray M'Cheyne (1813-1843)

Archbishop: A Christian ecclesiastic of a rank superior to that attained by Christ. Henry Louis Mencken

Pastor: One employed by the wicked to prove to them by his example that virtue doesn't pay. Henry Louis Mencken

I measure ministers by square measure. I have no idea of the size of a table, if you only tell me how long it is: but if you also say how wide, I can tell its dimensions. So, when you tell me what a man is in the pulpit, you must also tell me what he is out of it, or I shall not know his size -- JOHN NEWTON

Your mission is to evangelize, not to curse. Prove yourself to be an evangelist, not a tyrannical legislator. Men want to be led, not driven.- Oecolampadius to William Farel

If the word do not dwell with power in us,it will not go out with power from us. -- J Owen

Whatever vices and corruptions men see in the lives of their ministers will not be attributed to the depravity of their old nature which still abides in them, but to the gospel. - JOHN OWEN

Bear. Bear. Bear. Forbear. Forbear. Forbear. In yielding is victory. Fight the devil and love the deacon--Love him till he is loveable.
C. H. Spurgeon. Letters, p.77

Some ministers would make good martyrs. They are so dry, they would burn well.-- C H Spurgeon

THE VERY FIRST thing which needs to be said about Christian ministers of all kinds is that they are "under" people (as their servants) rather than "over" them (as their leaders, let alone their lords). Jesus made this absolutely plain. The chief characteristic of Christian leaders, he insisted, is humility not authority, and gentleness not power.- John Stott, The Gospel and the End of Time

Christianity is not a system of philosophy, nor a ritual, nor a code of laws; it is the impartation of a divine vitality. Without the way there is not going, without the truth there is no knowing, without life there is no living. MERRILL TENNEY on Jn 14:6

I look on all the world as my parish; thus far I mean, that, in whatever part of it I am, I judge it meet, right, and my bounden duty, to declare unto all that are willing to hear, the glad tidings of salvation. -- John Wesley (1703-1791)

There is no other head of the church but the Lord Jesus Christ. Nor can the pope of Rome, in any sense, be head thereof.
Westminster Confession of Faith (1646), ch 25:6

Our clerics neither evangelize like the apostles, nor go to war like the secular lords, nor toil like labourers.----John Wycliffe (?1330-1384) in The Lion Christian Quotation Collection, 1997

There was good reason for the silence of the Holy Spirit as to how,when, in what form Christ ordained the apostles, the reason being to show the indifferency of all forms of words. ---John Wycliffe (?1330-1384) in The Lion Christian Quotation Collection, 1997

In order to the existence of such a ministry in the Church, there is requisite an authority received from God, and consequently power and knowledge imparted from God for the exercise of such ministry; and where a man possesses these, although the bishop has not laid hands upon him according to his traditions, God has Himself appointed him.... John Wycliffe (1320?-1384)